Bobby Valentine to the Red Sox

As broken (for purposes of this blog) by Steve in the comments section to my last post, the Red Sox are about to announce the hiring of Bobby Valentine as manager...

This
move is going to come with lots of hype, but not sure if the
Yankees should be too worried. Valentine did a nice job for the most
part
with the Mets, getting them to the World Series in 2000, and he
certainly was entertaining, but overall, he's not been particularly
successful as a manager in MLB (he did have a great run in Japan with
the Chiba Lotte Marines from 2004-2009). He's managed for 15 seasons in
MLB and has just two postseason appearances to show for it, both wild
card berths with the Mets in 1999-2000, and in those seasons, the Mets
were pretty flush with talent. For his MLB career as a manager, his
winning percentage is just .510. He'll also be 61 years old next
season, so one has to wonder if he'll manage with the same vigor he
previously exhibited. This looks to be more of a personality hiring,
and like Steve mentioned, reminiscent of something Steinbrenner would
have done in the '80s.

The bigger issue for the Red Sox is the talent. They still have
plenty
of it in the form of Adrian Gonzalez, Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia,
Kevin Youkilis, Josh Beckett, and Jon Lester, but they've already lost
Jonathan Papelbon, they may lose David Ortiz, the pitching completely
failed the Sox down the stretch last year, and there was a clear
sense of disharmony among the Red Sox players last season as the team
suffered a historic September collapse. The offseason is still
relatively young, but it would seem the Red Sox still have much to
address, and the hiring of Valentine, while good press for the moment,
may ultimately be adding another ego to a clubhouse that seemed a little
too full of egos last year.

ADDENDUM

Tim Kurkjian of ESPN shared his thoughts on the Valentine hiring, noting among many other flattering remarks about his former Baseball Tonight analyst, that

Valentine is 61 now. He has matured greatly. He's not as smug and as
arrogant as he used to be, but not much else has changed. No one sells a
team, and the game, better than Valentine. When he takes on a project,
"I have to do the whole thing,'' he said.

Valentine will not allow Josh Beckett to not work in between starts. Valentine will find out how three of Carl Crawford's five tools
disappeared last year, and he will make sure he finds them in 2012...

The point Kurkjian seems to be getting at is that Valentine will not stand for all the reported shenanigans that went on in the Red Sox clubhouse last year. Kurkjian didn't go so far as to overtly say that, however, just imply it, and what Kurkjian doesn't mention is that Valentine was at the helm of the Mets when Bobby Bonilla and Rickey Henderson were reportedly in the clubhouse playing cards while the Mets were battling and eventually being eliminated in extra innings in the 1999 NLCS. So if the Red Sox are hoping that Valentine is the guy to come in to clean up the fractures and distractions among the team - well his track record suggests otherwise.